tiscali grief

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Johnson" <(E-Mail Removed)>
Newsgroups: uk.legal,alt.internet.providers.uk,uk.finance,uk.n et
Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2004 7:55 PM
Subject: Extraordinary abuse by Tiscali.




Extraordinary abuse by Tiscali.

I recently recieved a letter from Tiscali confirming
my instruction to Set-up a direct debit.
This came as a great surprise to me as I had not
instructed them to do anything.
The letter didn't say what the instruction was for
but asked me to call them if my bank details were
incorrect.
The number to call was not a free number either so I was reluctant
to call it. I called their free sales number and asked them to
cal me back but they refused (1000 excuses).
Afparently the instruction if for a 'pay as you go' account of which
I have no knowledge. (Do PAYG accounts require direct debits?).
I am pretty disgusted that Tiscali still have my bank details
even though I left them years ago.
I am also disgusted that they can use these details to set up a
direct debit without my permission.
I am disgusted that I have to pay talk to them about their
disgusting and underhand behaviour.

But what can I do to stop such abuse ( I am not sure if
they have done anything illegal or not).

What they have done is to used my old account details to
set-up or attempt to set up a direct debit for purposes
unknown to me? Is this illegal?
I am thinking data protection act or possible fraud, although
as I have blocked the direct debit (hopefully) I will never
know what they were attempting to do.
I am also worried they have used my data to sign me up
for an unknown service.
Qusetion is what can I do about it without running up
big phone bill calling them?

They sort of admitted their had been somesort of error but
still indicated that some sort of account was/is set up.
I put the phone down at this point.

John Smith wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "David Johnson" <(E-Mail Removed)>
> Newsgroups: uk.legal,alt.internet.providers.uk,uk.finance,uk.n et
> Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2004 7:55 PM
> Subject: Extraordinary abuse by Tiscali.
>
>
>
>
> Extraordinary abuse by Tiscali.
>
> I recently recieved a letter from Tiscali confirming
> my instruction to Set-up a direct debit.
> This came as a great surprise to me as I had not
> instructed them to do anything.
> The letter didn't say what the instruction was for
> but asked me to call them if my bank details were
> incorrect.
> The number to call was not a free number either so I was reluctant
> to call it. I called their free sales number and asked them to
> cal me back but they refused (1000 excuses).
> Afparently the instruction if for a 'pay as you go' account of which
> I have no knowledge. (Do PAYG accounts require direct debits?).
> I am pretty disgusted that Tiscali still have my bank details
> even though I left them years ago.
> I am also disgusted that they can use these details to set up a
> direct debit without my permission.
> I am disgusted that I have to pay talk to them about their
> disgusting and underhand behaviour.
>
> But what can I do to stop such abuse ( I am not sure if
> they have done anything illegal or not).
>
> What they have done is to used my old account details to
> set-up or attempt to set up a direct debit for purposes
> unknown to me? Is this illegal?
> I am thinking data protection act or possible fraud, although
> as I have blocked the direct debit (hopefully) I will never
> know what they were attempting to do.
> I am also worried they have used my data to sign me up
> for an unknown service.
> Qusetion is what can I do about it without running up
> big phone bill calling them?
>
> They sort of admitted their had been somesort of error but
> still indicated that some sort of account was/is set up.
> I put the phone down at this point.
>
>
>
>
Why not just instruct your bank not to accept any direct debits/standing
orders from them?

Advisable to do in writing.

If you bank on line you should be able to see if any are set up.


--
Robert Maskill G4PYR
Peterborough Cambridgeshire
www.coastalradio.greater-peterborough.com
www.robertmaskill.dsl.pipex.com

To uk.telecom.broadband and uk.telecom "John Smith" wrote:

>----- Original Message -----
>From: "David Johnson" <(E-Mail Removed)>
>Newsgroups: uk.legal,alt.internet.providers.uk,uk.finance,uk.n et

<<SNIP>>

So is this a phone account or a broadband account ? I doubt the post is
needed in both, and perhaps you could've just left it in the groups you
had posted it to originally (given there have already been a significant
number of posts). All of a sudden u.t has become quite "noisy"

so why add to the 'noise' then?

On Wed, 25 Feb 2004 22:07, "John Smith" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>so why add to the 'noise' then?

It seemed highly unlikely that sending something by e-mail to (E-Mail Removed)
would reach you (the owners of the domain may feel happy to complain
to your ISP about your misuse of that as an e-mail address, since it
is likely to cause their servers to receive unwanted junk mail). I
trust when you contact Tiscali you'll use a valid e-mail address!

I see there are several suggestions for you to consider in the thread
started yesterday and would urge others to read that, so as to not be
wasting time covering the same ground again. Peter M.

This happended to me once, though it was not Tiscali, I complained to
the bank and was told that certain companies have the right to set up
direct debits without signature etc, but not to worry as you are
covered under the direct debit guarantee. I was having none of that
and told them if it happended on my private bank account again, I
would up sticks and find another bank.

So they put a flag on my account so I have to be written to for
permission to go ahead with any DD request.

Some big companies are basically incompetent, it seems Tiscali are by
the feedback I have heard about them though have not dealt with them
perosnally.

Si

well , i suppose, some not very bright people might actuallly think that i
am trying to pass (E-Mail Removed) off as my email address , but not you i would
hope

jesus!

In message <c1je84$ekn$(E-Mail Removed)>, John Smith <(E-Mail Removed)>
writes
>well , i suppose, some not very bright people might actuallly think that i
>am trying to pass (E-Mail Removed) off as my email address , but not you i would
>hope
>
>jesus!
There's no suppose about it, the spammers harvest email addresses from
the newsgroups automatically, if you use an address you have no right
to, then that address gets the junk mail. If the address doesn't exist,
then the spammers have wasted their time (fractions of a second) but if
it does exist, the machines at the receiving end get hammered. It's
downright rude, if not against your ISP's T&Cs to do so. As it happens,
bc.com does exist, so you have no right to use the address.

--
Clint Sharp

Boise paper in fact..

Raises a good point that everyone should check their usenet ficticious
addresses to make sure they don't in fact exist.

No need to be sanctimonious about it though....

--
---

"Clint Sharp" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> In message <c1je84$ekn$(E-Mail Removed)>, John Smith <(E-Mail Removed)>
> writes
> >well , i suppose, some not very bright people might actuallly think that
i
> >am trying to pass (E-Mail Removed) off as my email address , but not you i would
> >hope
> >
> >jesus!
> There's no suppose about it, the spammers harvest email addresses from
> the newsgroups automatically, if you use an address you have no right
> to, then that address gets the junk mail. If the address doesn't exist,
> then the spammers have wasted their time (fractions of a second) but if
> it does exist, the machines at the receiving end get hammered. It's
> downright rude, if not against your ISP's T&Cs to do so. As it happens,
> bc.com does exist, so you have no right to use the address.
>
> --
> Clint Sharp

quite